WI: John Sherman elected Speaker after the 1858 elections?

After the 1858 elections the Republicans held the pluarlity in the House, and Southern Opposition holding the balance of power. After some dozen failed ballots the House elected William Pennington, Sherman getting close, but was too radical for some Republican-allies. If the Republicans could get a few more of them to vote for Sherman, or make it a plurality vote, what could be the long term effects on Sherman's career and for the US as a whole?
 
An old soc.history.what-if post of mine:

***

ObWI: What if Sherman is elected Speaker? (Over forty ballots were held,
and Sherman was often a tantalizing three or four votes away from
victory.) Though he was basically a moderate man whose chief interests
were in finance, and who repeatedly said that he was opposed to any
interference whatever by the North with the relation of "master and
servant" in the South, he was opposed by Southerners because he had
endorsed (as a routine campaign endorsement) a Republican compendium of
Helper's *Impending Crisis.* Southerners, especially South Carolinians,
uttered all sorts of dire threats about what might happen if Sherman were
elected Speaker. (It must be remembered that the situation was tense,
John Brown having only recently been hanged.) If Sherman is elected,
could we get South Carolina secession several months early? FWIW, Edmund
Ruffin in his diary of December 8, 1859, records a conversation with
members of the South Carolina, Alabama, and Mississippi delegations, all
of whom, he claimed, were "ready for secession." Probably wishful
overstatement on Ruffin's part. Still, at the very least I could see
South Carolinians withdrawing their delegation from the Congress. Or
perhaps something more drastic: Governor Gist of South Carolina in a
letter to Congressman William Porcher Miles said that withdrawal was
"preferable to ejecting the speaker elect by force" but added that "If
however, you upon consideration decide to make the issue of fire in
Washington, write or telegraph me, & I will have a Regiment in or near
Washington in the shortest possible time." https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/ZbRWMeYbfTU/5rKzn_QPHCQJ

***

Probably Gist's suggestion was too crazy even for South Carolina, though...
 
An old soc.history.what-if post of mine:

***

Probably Gist's suggestion was too crazy even for South Carolina, though...

Nothing is too crazy for antebellum South Carolina. But the idea of SC jumping the gun on Shermans election could be interesting.

Also what is OBWI?
 
Nothing is too crazy for antebellum South Carolina. But the idea of SC jumping the gun on Shermans election could be interesting.

Also what is OBWI?

"South Carolina is too small for a republic and too large for an insane asylum."

Obligatory What if
 
Top